


Blue

by Zabn



Category: SKAM (Norway)
Genre: Artist!Even, Enemies to lovers kind of thingy, Even and Isak are living in the same house - at least one summer, Fluff and Angst, Isak and Eva are yet again best friends in this because it's what makes me happy, M/M, Slow Burn, might add some tags as the story goes on if I don't forget about it, this is going to be angsty, writer!Isak
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-14
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2020-10-17 01:28:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20612684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zabn/pseuds/Zabn
Summary: Isak leans his head to the side, watches the houses of his old neighborhood passing by, and as they round the first corner he closes his eyes because he feels the tears coming back.It's going to be okay, love. Just breathe..or an au in which Isak hasn't only lost his mom, but also many other things that once meant so much to him. His father doesn't seem to care, though, he's too busy being all lovey-dovey with June, the new woman by his side. And as if that wouldn't already be enough Terje announces that June's nephew - a pretentious artist - will stay with them for the summer.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [amiratazz](https://archiveofourown.org/users/amiratazz/gifts).

The air’s heavy and hot but still Isak doesn’t regret his decision of throwing on a black shirt earlier in the morning. Looking at the sweat stains on his father’s light blue button down, he definitely made the right choice.

It’s one of these days you don’t really want to be outside, every breath fills your lungs with the heavy air, and you start sweating without even doing anything. The sun’s burning down on Isak's skin and face way too bright. It's just way too hot. Isak would prefer to be back inside surrounded by the cool air of his childhood home. Surrounded by the air that always carried a light scent of vanilla.

Children are playing a self-invented ball game down the street and Isak’s sure that they’re screaming and laughing, but he can't hear them since his headphones are blasting his favorite song way too loud for that.

The kids don’t really seem to care about the brutal heat out here, though, it seems like children have a higher tolerance for weather like that. Isak wonders if the hot weather bothered him when he was still little, but he can’t even remember if there actually have been summers like this one when he was a child.

Looking at these kids makes Isak feel strangely alone although his dad is standing only a few steps away from him. Conversations between the two are painfully awkward these days. If Isak’s honest they’ve always been it just wasn’t that obvious when his mom and sister still were around. His father tries, he really does, but Isak doesn’t want him to try. Isak’s more than fine with them not talking at all because he’s tired, so so tired of their monosyllabic exchanges about the weather, the food or whatever comes to Terje’s mind.

Isak leans back on his hands and regrets it immediately, the hot concrete burns on the skin of his palms. He curses silently and wraps his arms around one of his knees instead. His father glances down at him and gives him a small smile. Isak doesn’t return it, he averts his gaze and looks back to the children down the street.

On some days Isak wishes he could turn back time, just a few years. Back to when everything was easier when his mom was still around and still herself. He’d give everything to have these days back.

Isak can’t hold back an eye roll as a big, shiny white car rounds the corner. Of course, she’s driving one of these pretentious monsters. He stands up from the ground, and only as he notices his father’s boring glance on him he wipes the dirt from his jeans and lets his headphones disappear in his pockets.

The too big and too shiny car comes to hold in front of them, and within just a second June’s out the car, ready to greet them with her blinding smile and excited voice. That woman is all smiley and sunshine, Isak doesn’t know if he ever met someone who’s that painfully happy all the goddamn time.

“Hello, you two handsome men,” June sings, and Isak manages a small smile as she walks towards them.

His father beside him is smiling like a love-drunk idiot, Isak needs to look away as they greet each other with a short but still soft peck on the lips. He wonders if this will ever get easier or if it will feel like a knife cutting through his heart for the rest of time.

“Hei,” he says quietly, a little surprised himself by that as well. Okay, it didn’t sound as eager as June’s greeting, but the woman still seems to be surprised to hear it coming from him. And she seems rather happy about it because without a warning she wraps him in a tight hug, and Isak doesn’t know what else to do than to hug her back.

Okay, he promised his father earlier to be nice, or at least to try to be nice, so he won’t get grounded for the next weeks. But what’s happening at this right moment is definitely not what Isak had in mind when he said he would try to be nice.

As she lets go of Isak there’s a soft smile on her lips, and her whole face is even more glowing than it did before, probably she’s taking this as a huge step forward in their relationship. The hopeful glance in her eyes makes Isak’s stomach churn because he’s not ready to form any kind of relationship with this woman. Hell, he doesn’t even know what to say to her most of the time.

Thanks for stealing my dad? Thanks for letting him forget about mamma and Lea? Nothing really nice comes to his mind, and that’s why he rather keeps his mouth shut around her.

Look, Isak knows that it’s not her fault, not entirely, it’s mostly his dad’s fault. He’s the one who decided to forget about his wife within just a second and made his daughter move thousands of kilometers away. If you ask Isak, Terje’s the villain in this whole mess of a story, okay he’s no villain, though. Isak would rather call him an asshole although people told him multiple times already that it’s not okay to call your dad like that. So Isak reduced it down to “My dad’s acting like an asshole.”

But it’s not that he cares, though, Isak stopped caring a while ago, he can’t even remember when he decided to shut down. He can’t pinpoint the moment when he was simply done, with everything and almost everyone. The only things that bring him joy these days are skating, listening to his favorite music and hanging with his friends.

It’s as if with her, everything he loved left too, but Isak doesn’t want to think about this, it only leaves him feeling even number and more tired than he already does.

It’s such a cliché, isn’t it? A kid who doesn’t like his father’s new girlfriend. He knows it, okay? But that it’s a cliché still doesn’t change the fact that it is shit.

June’s trying to help Terje with their last moving boxes, but they’re way too heavy for her to lift. Isak’s not that much of an asshole to not help her, though, so he gently shoves her aside and says “Let me do this.”

If his dad dares to complain about his behavior later, Isak swears he’s going to break something because this here is not the bare minimum he actually intended to offer, alright.

The woman gives him another smile and Isak can see her hope growing even a little more. Fuck him for being so nice.

The moving boxes are stored in the car and Isak slides the duffel bag from his shoulders and throws it in the drunk beside the brown boxes. A shudder runs through his body as the realization finally seems to have sunken in.

It’s done. They’re done. These are their last seconds here. Probably the last time ever that he’ll be here.

Breathing suddenly feels hard, and his chest feels tight. Isak bites down his bottom lip, trying to even out his breathing. He can’t lose it, not here, not now.

His eyes land on his father, but he’s not really looking at the man, his eyes are looking through the man as Isak awkwardly stumbles out “I…I forgot something.”

Isak takes a step forward and grabs the key from his father’s hand before the man can actually fathom what his son's doing.

Terje screams after him, but Isak ignores his father’s words as he runs back to the house. Isak hates how dramatic he’s acting right now. He can’t stand it, but he just can’t leave without taking it with him. He thought he could leave it behind, but he was wrong, more than wrong.

Isak opens the front door but hesitates to step back in there. He didn’t walk around one last time when they left the house earlier. He just walked out of the house without really saying goodbye to it, without looking back. Isak didn’t want to behave like a sentimental idiot, but well here he is now.

His eyes fill with tears as soon as he steps over the threshold, he quickly wipes his fingers over them. It’s cool in here, but not only because of the temperature and the light smell of vanilla seems to have vanished. Isak didn’t think it would be so hard to leave, it’s just a house after all. Four walls with a roof on top.

This house has been his home for so many years, until the day his sister left and eventually his mother did as well. It’s not his home anymore, it’s just a house, so why’s it still so hard to say goodbye?

Probably because these four walls are filled with so many memories, so many precious memories, but also bad ones. Isak and his sister Lea grew up here after all. It’s the house in which the siblings made their first steps in, spoke their very first words, learned to make the perfect cocoa from their mother.

There's still the dark blemish on the wooden floor in the kitchen from their very first house party and Lea thought it would be a great idea to let people smoke in here. There are still their height measurements caved in the door frame of the kitchen.

Isak brushes his fingers over it, he quickly wipes over his eyes so the tears won’t roll down his cheeks.

He wishes Lea would be here, and not thousands of kilometers away in Germany. His sister would wrap him a warm hug and make a dumb joke or say something stupid just to make him laugh. Just to make this here a lot easier.

For a split-second, he thinks about calling her. He thinks about telling her that he can’t do this without her and mamma, that he can’t handle this on his own. But he doesn’t because in the end, it wouldn’t change a thing. He would still be here alone in that empty house that they once called their home, and she wouldn’t be here.

Isak walks along the kitchen to the living room, the rooms look eerie without any furniture, it looks like no one has lived here in quite some time. Isak takes a shaky breath before he walks up to the French windows and slides one of them open. His feet lead him to the little shabby shed in the back corner of the yard, he opens the creaking door and the familiar old, woody scent fills his nostrils.

Memories, so many fucking memories are flooding his mind. Isak closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Trying to push them back somewhere in the very back of his mind, somewhere where they can't come back up that easily again.

He opens his eyes again, and they're focusing immediately on the silver words written on the flourish wallpaper. He takes a few steps closer, stares at the words until his sight gets blurry.

“_It's going to be okay, love. Just breathe.”_

Marianne wrote those words four years ago, and she told Isak to look at them whenever he felt lost or wanted to give up. His mother infected Isak with her sheer passion for poems and beautiful words in general. He even started to write them himself, and she loved his poems and words the most.

Isak rips the piece of wallpaper with his mother's words from the wooden wall and presses it close to his heart. He can’t leave it here, he needs to take those words with him because there’s not much left from his mom. But these words are her, the woman she used to be before sickness changed her and eventually took her away from him. He can't leave them here for the next owner to paint over them without even spending a single thought to these words.

He folds the piece of wallpaper with his shaky fingers and buries it in the pocket of his jeans. Steps are coming closer and only seconds later someone’s slowly opening the thin wooden door afraid to ruin a moment. Without turning around, he says with a rather hoarse voice “I'm coming.”

“Okay,” June says with a soft voice, she steps out the shed again, leaving Isak some space and it's probably the first time Isak's truly thankful for something she does.

.

As Isak leaves the shed, the piece of wallpaper safe in the pocket of his jeans, his eyes a bit red from his tears, no one’s standing out there. June seems to have gone back to his father, and Isak’s thankful that she has at least a bit of an idea of when he needs his privacy and wants to be left alone.

He closes the wooden door, and exhales loudly, the last time he’ll do this, the last time he’ll stand here in their backyard. It feels surreal and a part of him still can't truly believe it.

His mother’s favorite flowers are blooming gloriously at the side of the house despite the biting heat. Marianne loved them so much, and she loved caring for them, she cared for them like they were her children. Her mind found peace in gardening, the work distracted her from her sometimes too dark thoughts.

Isak would take all the flowers with him if he only could, but he’s afraid they would die if he would take them away from here. And a little part of him is afraid that his mother wherever she might be now wouldn’t find them if he would take them with him.

He walks up to the graceful bushes with slow steps. His hand reaching out, taking a single petal between his fingers, feeling the soft and cool surface of it.

He smiles, fighting back another wave of tears from rolling down his cheeks. He lightly shakes his head, Jesus, since when is he such a crybaby? Isak wipes his fingers over his eyes for what feels like the hundredths time today. If Eva could see him right now she would stop calling him a heartless fucker. (She only does that to tease him, though.)

Isak rips a blossom of the stem and lays it carefully in his hand, he wants to take at least one of them with him. At least one blossom to remind him of the beauty his mother has created. The beauty that made all this their home.

.

Opening the back door of the car Isak awaits his father to say something, he awaits at least a stupid remark from the man’s mouth. But it doesn’t come, instead the man looks at his son with a soft glance, Isak can’t stand it, so he quickly looks away from his dad’s eyes.

The drive to June’s house is quiet, only some classical music is playing silently in the background and Isak wishes June and Terje would talk about something. About anything. The silence in the car is deafening and the supposed to be short ride feels like it’s taking them forever. Isak hates every second of it, he wishes he could just open the door and jump out the riding car. His phone buzzes in his pocket, rips his thoughts from that, let’s be honest, dramatic and more than stupid idea.

**Eva** ♥ - the screen lights up with an old picture of Isak and her. For a second Isak thinks about rejecting her call, but he knows his best friend too well, Eva will try again and again. And again until he picks up his damn phone.

“Hei,” Isak says, his voice sounding a bit hoarse.

“That bad?” Eva asks, her voice always goes a tint softer when she’s worried.

“We’re still on our way,” Isak answers trying his best to make his voice sound a bit more normal, not like he’s been crying.

“Oh. Call me whenever, okay?” the girl’s voice is so impossible soft that Isak’s eyes start to tear up again.

“Thank you, Evi,” Isak manages to say, and he can hear her smile at the other end of the line. “Anytime, Is.”

Isak hangs up and silence settles in the car again, he lets his body sink in the comfortable cushion, and he wishes it would swallow him. He fishes out his headphones and puts them on, he doesn’t care if his father will complain about it later.

He can’t take that silence in here anymore, it makes his thoughts wander to where he doesn’t want them to be. He needs music to fill his head, to drown out the thoughts that try to creep out of the back of his mind again.

Isak leans his head to the side, watches the houses of his old neighborhood passing by, and as they round the first corner he closes his eyes because he feels the tears coming back.

_It's going to be okay, love. Just breathe._


	2. Chapter 2

“_Isak?”_

He startles as he feels a hand on his shoulder, he quickly opens his eyes and removes his headphones.

“Huh?” is all his startled mind comes up with as his wide eyes look in his father’s smiling face. How can he smile like that? Isn't he at least a tiny bit sad that they just left a part of them behind? Isak doesn't understand this man one bit.

“We're almost home,” Terje says with so much glee that it makes Isak’s stomach sink to the ground.

_Home._ How in the world can he already call this their _home_? Is all of this that easy for him?

Isak swallows hard, he swallows the words that try to make their way out of his mouth, he only gives his father a short nod. He puts his headphones back on and turns his head to look out the window. He needs to look away from the man's face, and the happiness it's expressing. Isak really can't stand looking at him, he just can’t take it.

He wonders for how long it’ll stay this way. He wonders if this nagging dread in his stomach and the numbness in his heart will ever go away or if it'll stay this way until the day he's saved enough money to leave all this behind and live in an apartment on his own.

Isak looks down at the delicate blossom in his hand and takes a deep breath trying to calm down the rising storm inside his chest, inside his whole body. This is just a move, nothing big. Just switching houses. He can do that. People do this every day, and they don't take it as hard as he does. They're happy about it, thrilled with anticipation even. Shit, even his friends sounded happy as fuck as he told them about the move.

Isak hated every single one of them at that moment. Not really, though, but he hated their reaction and joy, especially since they knew how much Isak dislikes June and the fact that his father is head over heels for that woman. Eva was the only one who didn't seem to be happy at all, she looked concerned. The girl looked at him with that certain glance in her eyes, and Isak hates that glance. It's like she can see right through him, and he despises it so fucking much.

The boy takes another deep breath and his green eyes wander back out the window, he immediately notices the change of neighborhood. One house is seemingly bigger and more pompous than the other. Isak doesn't even want to think about how expensive these more than pretentious status symbols are. The sight doesn’t impress him, not at all. He rolls his eyes, obviously, June’s living in such a posh area.

He never saw the house before, no, he just figured as much when he met her for the first time. Isak never set a foot in the woman's house before because he simply didn't care. Look, he even refused to meet her most of the time. He thought until the day his father told him that they would move in with her that the thing between the two of them was only a fling. A short-lived affair at the most, one that wouldn't last longer than a few months. Something that would fade as quickly as it started.

But it didn't. June's still here and how it looks she certainly will stay for a while. Or rather said they will stay for a while.

June drives the car up a long driveway that's surrounded by tall, lush, well-cut trees and colorful blooming bushes. Isak has never seen a house surrounded by such a pompous green space ever before. He almost clenches his hand to a fist, but as his fingers touch the soft, cold surface of the blossom in there he doesn't. He needs to control himself, he can't destroy the only thing that still connects him to their old house, to his mother, just because of a short fit of frustration and anger blazing through his body.

Isak presses his nose against the glass of the car window like a little kid, not only to see everything properly but also to leave a greasy spot behind in the perfectly clean car. It's childish, he knows, but it makes him feel at least a tiny bit better about this fucked up situation.

After the last turn, June's house comes in sight and Isak's eyes widen. Well, house isn't the right word for it, mansion would be more fitting. Maybe not as big, but it definitely comes close to one. As much as Isak hates to admit it but the house looks like an architectural masterpiece, like straight out of a magazine or a house a celebrity would live in.

Isak wonders, why the hell a single person needs such a big house? What do you even do with so much space? Why does one person need fifteen fucking rooms that are probably empty most of the time anyway?

The car comes to hold right in front of the house. They get out of the car and Isak almost stumbles over his own feet as he grabs the duffel bag from the back seat, he just can’t stop staring at the huge building. It’s like his eyes are glued to it.

“Isak, son?” the words out of his father's mouth startle him as much as the hand his shoulder. Again. Can he stop pretending that everything's fucking fine for his new woman? Can he stop laying his hand on his shoulder like it’s something he’s done ever since Isak was a little boy. Can he stop acting like this an actual thing he does all the time? They don’t have a relationship like that, Isak doesn’t even know if they have a relationship at all.

The boy feels the inner urge to shrug his father's hand off his shoulder, but he doesn't, instead, he forces a small smile on his lips. He's helping his father to pretend that everything's fine, he hates himself a little bit for it, but he does it anyway. He doesn’t want to challenge his father, doesn't want to cause another fight, he’s too tired for anything like that. He wants to keep the peace, at least for today.

“Let's go,” Terje says and gives his son a bright smile. Isak, like so many other times before today, has to avert his gaze. He hates to admit it but his father's happiness cuts through him like a knife. He doesn't understand how the man can be this happy while his heart feels like it's slowly withering in his chest.

Isak doesn't understand how his father hasn't shed a single tear today. How the man can move on like that. Did their past mean so little to him? Did Marianne even mean anything to him? Yeah, it's been almost a year now, but still, Isak doesn't get how the man can be so quick to move on, to leave their old life behind in the blink of an eye.

Isak hasn’t seen his father being that happy in years, he doesn’t even know if he’s ever seen him that happy before. The man’s happiness makes Isak want to grab him by his shoulders and shake him. He wants to shake him until he comes back to his senses until he realizes how wrong all of this is until he realizes what it's doing to his son. He wants to scream at Terje's face until all the frustration and numbness is out of his body. But he doesn't.

Isak realized that his father wouldn't care anyway, he's too much of a selfish asshole to understand how Isak feels about this. He only has his luck and happiness in mind, Isak doesn't think that even one single thought of the man is wasted on him, his own son.

So, he's learned to be okay with it, does he have another choice, though? Isak's learned to only scream on the inside, to wear his calm, unbothered mask when he's around other people. He's gotten very good at hiding his feelings – or rather say the absence of them – these past months.

“Yeah,” Isak answers quietly and follows Terje and June up to the house.

June seems to be nervous, she looks between Isak and his father, but as Terje gives her a smiley nod, she opens the front door. She leads them into their new _home_, the bright, sunshine smile back on her lips.

Isak takes a breath as he enters the cool of the house, inhaling the air, trying to make out what it smells like in here. But it doesn’t smell like anything, just clean and cool. Isak has never been in a house that smelt like _nothing_.

Eva’s home smells like freshly baked cookies most of the time and a little hint of her mother's perfume lingers in the air at any time. Jonas’ home smells a little like lavender and freshly washed laundry. Isak associates almost every home with a scent, but June’s house just smells clean, kind of sterile. Not like a home at all.

He hoped for something, anything, in the house that would make him feel at least a little comfortable. Something that would be at least a little welcoming and not leave him with that sensation of being painfully foreign. But right after he took the first breath of the cold, clean air he felt like he didn't belong here, not at all.

This will never be his home, his home is still the empty house twenty minutes away. The house that used to carry a light scent of vanilla. The house with the height measurements carved in the door frame and the dark blemish on the kitchen floor. The house his sister and he grew up in.

“Welcome to your new home, my loves,” June interrupts Isak's train of thoughts, and her smile is as bright as the sun. The clacking noise of her heels echoes from the walls in the big hall and it makes Isak even more uncomfortable in his skin.

“Where's my room?” Isak presses out between his lips, trying his best to sound not too rude. According to the glare his father shoots him, it didn't come out the way he intended but Isak doesn't care. He's done, so done with playing nice for now. He needs a fucking break. He needs to get away from these two. He needs to be alone. He needs space to breathe.

“It's okay,” June says softly and puts a hand on Terje's chest. A gesture so small and yet so tender and intimate that Isak has to quickly look away.

“Come, I'll show you,” June says with the same soft voice and indicates to follow her.

He follows June up the stairs, the noise of her heels being even louder as she gracefully climbs up the stairs. The noise seems to be getting louder and louder in Isak's ears, he tries his best to shut it out. Only a few seconds left and he can finally be alone.

“Here it is,” the woman opens one of two chic-looking, wooden doors.

The room is huge and Isak has no idea what the hell he’s supposed to do with so much space all for himself. He doesn’t even know what furniture to put in here to make it look a little smaller, a little cozier, a little homier.

June’s eyes are searching his face for a reaction, Isak feels like he has to say something, anything, to fill that suddenly more than awkward silence between them.

“It’s huge,” is all that comes out of his mouth and he sighs internally. He has to come up with better and more believable replies in the future.

It stays all that makes it over his lips because he doesn’t know what else to say, his mind still trying to figure out what a single person could use such a big room for.

“Your father thought you’d like the room,” the woman says, her voice sounding a tit insecure, despite her expression still being all smiley. Isak internally rolls his eyes because he doesn't want to be that rude, it's not entirely her fault after all.

Of course, his father thought it’d be a great idea, another confirmation that the man does know nothing about him. His father literally knows shit about him.

“I just need to get used to it, I guess,” Isak fakes another smile. “My old room wasn’t even half as big.”

The sentence is followed by an awkward chuckle of the boy and he just wants to run away at this point. God, can it get even weirder and more awkward?

June slowly nods, her eyes wander around the room again before she looks back at Isak “We’ll figure something out, Isak. We could put a couch in here, to make it cozier. One with a sleeping function so that your friends can stay overnight.”

“Yeah,” Isak nods. It's silent again between them and he wishes with every fiber of his body that the woman will get the hint and leave him alone for now. Thankfully she does.

“I let you adjust a bit to all of this if you’re ready come down to the kitchen and I can show you around a bit, yeah? Or you can walk around on your own. Whatever you prefer, it's your home too now.” June speaks her words with so much care and warmness, that it’s hurting Isak. And it's making him feel bad in some kind of way. Maybe under different circumstances, he would've really liked her.

“Okay,” is all he manages to get out before the woman leaves him alone in the too big room.

Isak sighs as he lets the duffel bag slide from his shoulder and walks up to the huge bed. He frees the blossom he took from their old yard from the light fist his hand formed and carefully places it on his new nightstand.

He takes a deep breathe while toeing off his shoes, and then he crawls on the impossibly huge bed. The boy sits there looking around the room, now feeling even more foreign in this house than he already did when he stepped in.

Isak lets himself fall back on the mattress. Of fucking course, it's the most comfortable one he's ever lied on. He feels a scream of frustration bubbling up in his stomach, but he doesn't let it out. He swallows hard to keep it in. Instead, he presses his eyes shut, hard, until the dark behind his lids flickers with little, bright flashes.

He runs one of his hands over his face, and exhales loudly, trying to calm his nerves before he'll call back Eva. He doesn't want her to worry too much, and he doesn't want to whine too much about this shitty situation.

But like so often Eva beats him to it, Isak's phone pings in his pocket and he knows without looking that it's his best friend.

.

  
  


.

Isak carelessly throws his phone on the bed beside him, it almost lands on the ground, but he catches it just in time. He decides to place it on his nightstand, just to be sure. His father will definitely kill him if he breaks a fourth phone-screen in the span of 6 months.

Isak leans up and a deep, tired sigh escapes his mouth. He shuffles to his duffel bag and opens its zipper with a lazy pull. Both his hands dive in the bag to search for the dark blue notebook he threw in there in the morning. A few other of his things land on the floor before he finally finds it. He slowly takes it out, his fingers slowly gliding over its cover.

It feels rough and soft at the same time, Isak swallows as he looks down at it. It's been a long time since he held it in his hands for more than a few seconds without wanting to bury it somewhere deep down so he’d never have to see it again.

He won’t write in it, no, it’s something he’ll probably never do ever again. But it’ll be fine to press the blossom he took from their old back yard. A single blossom of his mother’s favorite flowers. A tiny thing that will remind him of her and _their home_.

Isak opens the notebook somewhere in the middle, just to be sure he won't have to read any of the words he's written in there many weeks ago, some even months ago. He can't look at them, that's not him anymore. This chapter of his life is over, done.

The blossom’s light orange petals are standing out against the blank, white pages of the notebook. Isak also grabs out the wallpaper with his mother's words on it and places it between the pages as well. Like that it'll be safe until Isak finds the right spot for it to place. Isak closes his notebook and places it on the nightstand. He needs to place a few heavy books on it so the blossom will get properly pressed and dried.

The boy starts walking around his new, way too big room with quiet and slow steps. He opens the elegant, white curtains covering the huge French windows. They lead out to a (surprisingly) rather small balcony. The balcony overlooks the thriving back yard, flowers are blooming in every possible color out there. The green of the lawn is so bright and lush, it looks artificial. 

A deep frown appears on his forehead and he pulls the curtains shut with a heavy, angry tug. Why does everything need to look so perfect around here?

Isak throws himself on the bed again and buries his face in the new pillow. It smells like fabric softener. A familiar scent and as stupid as it sounds but within a second he feels less foreign. It's a tiny teeny thing but it makes this weirdly huge room feel a little homier. Just a bit, but Isak guesses that it’s better than nothing.

He wakes up to a weight lying down beside him on the bed and a hand lazily carding through his blond curls. He must've dozen off while inhaling the scent of his new pillow.

"Sorry, I fell asleep," he mumbles quietly without opening his eyes.

"Don't worry. Your dad let me in," Eva's voice is quiet, as quiet as a whisper. It's soothing. Isak likes it when Eva speaks like that. He could listen to her calm voice for hours, somehow it reminds him of his mother's voice when she read him poems.

He turns his head towards her and eventually opens his eyes. She's smiling at him, it's one of those tentative, small smiles. _I know it's shit, but I'm here._

"Thank you," Isak mumbles quietly, burying his face in the pillow again. She knows for what, she always does.

"No need to," she whispers back, slips under the covers and cuddles closer to her best friend. Isak lets himself sink into her embrace and for the first time on this day he feels comfort and a little bit at home.

"That room is fucking huge," he can hear the amused, but still confused grin in her voice. Like Isak, Eva isn't used to dimensions like that. They both grew up in more or less tiny but still cozy houses.

"If you haven't noticed the whole house is fucking huge, Eva," Isak scoffs with his tired voice and earns a light smack on the back of his head for his smart remark.

"Ouch," he quietly whines and Eva lets out an annoyed breath of air.

"Shut up, that didn't even hurt."

It's silent between them for a while and Isak's whole being eventually starts to relax. The tension leaves his muscles, the clenching in his heart slowly starts to fade, and the anger and frustration in his stomach stop bubbling.

He calls it the Eva-Effect. He’s more than thankful to have her, although deep down he knows all too well that he doesn’t deserve her friendship. Not at all.

"You want to explore the house together?" Isak asks quietly after a while, not wanting to follow his thoughts down this rather dark route again. He's holding a strand of her shiny, auburn hair between his fingers and plays with it. It’s something he’s done since they were little kids.

"Sure, but first let us take a nap, Issy baby," her words are followed by a quiet yawn.

"Don't call me that," Isak complains with an eye roll, but he's getting ignored by the girl. She closes her eyes and buries her face deeper in the pillow. Isak wonders if the smell of the fabric softener gives her a feeling of home as well. He doesn’t ask, though, he doesn’t want to be made fun of something so silly. Probably Eva wouldn’t do that, but better safe than sorry.

Isak drifts off into a deep slumber in the arms of his best friend. A tiny part of him thinks that this day isn't that shitty after all.

.

.

“Wakey wakey, sleepyhead,” Isak says and pokes his best friend's nose.

Eva presses her eyes tightly shut and yawns heartily before she eventually opens them. Her gaze is sleepy, she looks barely awake. “What time is it?”

“It is half past six,” Isak says after checking the time on his phone. There's a message from Jonas but he chooses to ignore it for now.

“Already?” Eva sighs. “We should be out there making this the _best summer ever_ but instead we're here sleeping away the time our lives.”

“How can you be this amount of dramatic right after waking up?” Isak groans and runs a hand over his face.

“I'm not dramatic, I'm just saying how it is.” Eva leans up and checks her phone. She frowns and stares at the screen for a few seconds before she puts it away again.

“Is everything okay?” Isak asks cautiously.

“Yeah, everything's fine,” she says, her eyes staring at the ceiling. It’s silent in the room after that. The girl turns her head to look in his face. “When will it stop to feel weird? Will it ever stop?”

“I don't know,” Isak answers honestly, giving her an apologetic smile. He wishes he could tell Eva when things between Jonas and her will start to feel normal again. When the awkward silences will end, when not every word will sound like a little stab or an accusation. Isak has no idea, but he also wondered about that a few times already.

Eva sighs deeply and licks her lips, she closes her eyes for a few seconds before she eventually speaks “Can we grab something to drink and maybe a little something to eat?”

“Sure,” Isak says and gets up from the bed. “But first we got to find the kitchen, though.”

“I don't like to repeat myself but well you don’t leave me much of a choice. You're a dumbass, love, a literal dumbass.”

“Shut up!” Isak rolls his eyes and walks up to the door. “Get your ass up and let's find it.”

“Rude!” Eva huffs and throws a pillow at him. But the pillow only hits the door and lands with a quiet thud on the floor because Isak’s already out of the room.

.

“These stairs somehow remind me of those cliché American teenage movies,” Eva chuckles. She slows her steps and ads. “When they walk down in their corny prom dresses ready to have the time of their lives. Their parents stand at the end and take like thousands of pictures of them.”

Isak doesn't tell her that he thought the exact same thing when he saw the two stairs across each other leading up to the first floor. He just scoffs “You really need to stop watching those movies, though.”

“You're right,” Eva laughs it off. “But sometimes they’re nice, you know.”

“I know,” Isak nods, and of course he’ll watch every single shitty teenage movie with her. It’s what best friends do after all, right? Through bad and good movies or something like that.

They walk along the big hall, and Isak tries to be as quiet as possible because it’s still making him feel uncomfortable how every so little noise seems to echo back twice as loud from the walls. Eva's head slowly swings from one side to the other, looking around Isak's new home, taking in every little thing.

He wonders what she thinks about all this, but knowing her she’ll tell him soon enough.

“There it is.” Eva smiles at him as they step in the kitchen. Just like the rest of the house the furniture and walls are held in decent colors, lots of white and gray. Just a few pastel highlights here and there. Surprisingly it makes the kitchen look homey. It's the first room in the house that doesn't feel that foreign to Isak.

“You think it's okay if we just look around for something to drink and eat?” Isak’s dumb question is out of his mouth before he can think twice about it.

Eva huffs out a laugh and lightly shakes her head “Yeah, I think so. It's your home after all.”

“Your friend’s right, Isak.” he startles as he hears June's voice coming from the door.

“Hi, I'm Eva,” Eva puts on her loveliest smile and Isak internally rolls his eyes. “Nice to meet you.”

“June. And it's nice to meet you too, love,” June's smile is as bright as the sun and Isak's stomach churns. He swallows hard.

“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, I just heard you coming down,” June’s voice is getting nervous and her smile fades a bit as she searches Isak’s face. Isak wonders what she’s searching for.

“It’s okay,” Eva says quickly, realizing that Isak won’t say anything.

“Go on, help yourself.” June tries her best to compose herself, she forces the bright smile back to her lips. “You should find everything for sandwiches in the fridge, just as fresh juice and iced tea.”

“Thank you, June,” Eva says, mirroring her smile. Isak says it too, but he’s not sure if it came out loud enough for her to hear. The woman leaves them alone again and Isak exhales slowly. Will it forever be like this?

“So sandwiches it is, huh?” Eva shakes him out of his thoughts as she opens the fridge beside him.

“Yeah, I guess.”

They prepare sandwiches and each have a glass of iced tea. Isak hates to admit it but it all tastes delicious. They eat in silence, he can tell that Eva wants to say something but she's holding back. He can literally see it on the way she's chewing her bites of the sandwich. The way she’s eyeing him in that certain kind of way.

Isak tries to ignore it because he doesn't want to talk about any of this right now. Not today. Maybe some other day. Maybe never.

“Not today, okay?” Isak says quietly after he swallowed his last bite.

“Okay,” Eva nods and takes a sip from her iced tea.

.

“Oh my God, is that seriously an indoor pool?” Eva stuns with her mouth hanging open.

“Seems like it,” Isak huffs and closes the door behind them. He’s not going to pretend that he’s not surprised in a positive way that his new house has an indoor pool. And yes, Isak will refuse to call this his home until a very long time, maybe he’ll never call it like that.

Isak slowly follows his best friend deeper in the room, his eyes wander to the surface of the blue water. Its reflections are beautifully dancing on the ceiling.

Both their steps are quietly echoing from the walls. Every sound in here feels muffled in a way and a little less loud than outside. It’s comforting.

Isak takes a breath, inhales the damp, heavy air that smells a tint like chlorine. It’s a nice smell, though, it reminds him of the days he spent with Eva at the public pool. Good old days. When things weren’t that complicated when the world seemed a little less sad and cruel.

“Imagine the parties we could throw here.” Eva rips him out of his daydreams about the old days. There’s a huge smile on her face and her eyes are shining with excitement. Maybe she was thinking of those old days too. Maybe she was just thinking about those parties. Isak doesn’t ask.

“We?” he scoffs instead and Eva rolls her eyes at him.

“Yeah, dumbass. We.”

She continues to walk around, letting her eyes discover the room. To be honest Isak is impressed too but he won't say that out loud. Only thinking about speaking it out makes his tongue feel itchy in his mouth.

Eva fumbles her phone out of her pocket and connects it to the speakers in the room. Isak sees her thumb gliding over the screen, apparently looking for the right song. A small grin tugs at the corner of her lips, it seems like she found what she was looking for.

Isak rolls his eyes as he hears the first beats of the song, but he can’t help but mirror the girl’s grin. Eva turns to him and starts to sing along. She dances towards Isak and grabs his hands to pull him closer. She moves her shoulders and exaggeratedly swings her hips, it looks ridiculous and Isak barks out a laugh. It feels good to laugh. It's freeing.

Isak’s laughter seems to motivate the girl even more. Her ridiculous moves slowly morph into actual dancing, her voice singing along even louder than before. Isak watches her with a smile, he's getting infected by the sheer happiness his best friend is radiating at this right moment.

“Come on, dance and sing with me,” the girl swirls around with a loud laugh. She looks beautiful, with her auburn hair open and that blinding smile on her face.

Isak chimes in and sings along with her, and he even starts to dance with her. His moves aren’t as gracefully as hers, not at all. Isak feels a bit like a clumsy fawn on a frozen lake but it doesn’t matter right now.

They dance dangerously close to the edge of the pool and Isak can’t resist. He wraps his arms around his best friend. And only a second later they both dive in the cool blue.

“Is, what the fuck!?” the muffled echo of Eva's screeching scream fills Isak’s ears as soon as he comes back to the surface.

Isak can’t hold back his laughter while he clumsily wipes the wet strands of hair out of his face. “What?”

“You're unbelievable,” the girl grunts with a played annoyed expression on her face. Isak can clearly see that she's holding back a laugh.

He only gives her a dumb grin as response, which gets wiped from his face with a splash of water. As he opens his eyes again there’s a huge smile on the girl’s face and there's nothing else he can do but mirror it.

“A bit better now?” she asks quietly, while she swims closer to him.

“Yeah,” Isak answers honestly, the smile still on his lips.

“Good,” Eva shortly nods and before Isak can even react her hands are already on his head and she dives him underwater. Even surrounded by the cool blue he can hear her ringing laugh.

Maybe it's not going to be as awful as he thought it would be. Maybe with Eva by his side, he can do this. Maybe with her by his side, it's going to be okay.

.

  
.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again lovely people ♥  
A new chapter is here and as always I hope you liked the update ♥  
Thank you so much for every single kudo and comment.. they mean the world to me ♥  
.  
The biggest thank you goes to my love, Mir ♥ You're the best and I love you to the moon and back ♥♥


	3. Chapter 3

The water is gently pattering against Isak’s skin. He waits for the stream of hot water to relax his tensed muscles. He waits for the tiredness that still lingers in his whole body to disappear. It's too damn early for him to be up already.

He has no idea if he even slept for a second last night. He can remember that he tossed and turned for what felt like an eternity. When he gave up doing that, he just stared at the ceiling, wondering if his occasional insomnia somehow managed to sneak its way back.

Isak was still wide awake when single, quiet drops became proper rain at around four in the morning. And he was still wide awake as the birds started chirping around five even though it was pouring outside. He kept staring at the ceiling until he thought it was a decent enough time to get up without his father annoying him with questions.

Usually Isak gets up sometime in the afternoon when he doesn't have to drag his tired body to school. So, it wouldn't be that surprising if his father would be kind of confused when he gets up that early and being his father, he wouldn't be able to not comment on it.

Isak runs his fingers over his dripping wet face, trying to wipe away all these nagging thoughts that fly around his mind. He tries to flush them down the drain, together with the hot water. Isak stays in the shower until the water slowly turns from hot to lukewarm.

He can already hear his father's complaints about him wasting so much water. Maybe he's not that wrong about it, but it's not like Isak's doing this every day, okay. Sometimes a long, hot shower is just needed. Self-care and stuff like that, you know.

He grabs a big, gray towel from a shelf in the bathroom, and lazily dries his body with it. Afterwards he wraps it around his waist, and leaves the steamy bathroom. And no, he's not going to waste a single thought on the fact that this towel is the softest towel he's ever used in his whole life.

Isak peeks out the curtains of the French window. The sky's gray and heavy, and the rain’s still coming down in sheets. It feels like yesterday's brutal heat was only a dream – some kind of feverish nightmare he had.

Even on a gloomy day like this, the flowers, the bushes, the grass – everything – still looks so colorful, lush and just perfect outside. Isak hates it, every fiber of his body hates it. He bites down on his bottom lip to keep the rising anger in his chest at bay. A little harder, and he's sure he'd taste blood.

Well, it seems like it's still there. The frustrating anger. He doesn't know why he thought it would magically vanish overnight. He really hoped for it to be gone or at least to be less intense. Oh, what foolish thought that was, wasn't it? It's clearly still there, in his stomach, his chest, his fingers, his toes. In every tiny bit of his body.

Isak closes his eyes and takes a few deep breaths to calm himself down again. This is only the second day. It’s going to be okay in a few weeks or let's say months. Seems a little more realistic, though. He can do this. One day it’s going to be okay. A likely story. Right?

He wanted to meet the boys at the skate park later today, but since it’s raining like crazy, he assumes that this plan is as good as dead. He really looked forward to hanging out with them, and to burn off some energy at the skate park.

If he’d still live in his old house he would invite them over to play some FIFA and to smoke a few, but he doesn’t want to invite them over to June’s house. Not yet.

He's not keen on hearing Magnus and Mahdi gush about how amazing and awesome this place is. He doesn’t want to hear Jonas say that it's not that bad, and he should stop acting like a brat.

Isak loves the boys, he really does, but sometimes he feels like they just don't really get him. Obviously, it's mostly his own fault because communicating his true feelings and thoughts isn't exactly one of his strengths.

He sighs, and his eyes fall on the brown moving boxes in the far corner of the room. Maybe he should unpack them. Make himself at home. _Home._ That word once more leaves a bitter taste on his tongue although he hasn't even spoken it out.

His eyes wander around the room, it still feels too big for him alone. He has no idea what to do with so much space. He wishes his old room back – the cozy, small room he felt so comfortable and safe in. His mom used to call it his little cave.

Not one of the boxes is opened, and yet he doesn't want to continue unpacking. He sits in the midst of his room staring at the brown boxes like they're some kind of enemy he has to defeat.

The noise of his loud exhale fills the room, he literally has no idea where to start, which one to unpack first. Perhaps it's best to let them stand there in the middle of the room, this way it won't look even bigger and emptier than it already is.

The loud ping of his phone startles him, but he more than welcomes the distraction – everything to postpone unpacking those damn boxes. He quickly gets on his feet and makes his way to the nightstand.

His excitement about the interruption vanishes as soon as he sees his sister’s name on the screen. Isak runs a hand through his damp hair, chewing nervously on his inner cheek.

Another message from her. It's probably the fifteenth she sent in these past two days. Isak hasn't answered any of them yet, neither has he answered her calls. He doesn't know what to say, and he’s even more scared of saying the wrong thing.

.

.

Isak stares at the screen for minutes, his thumb hovering over the letters. Tears form in the corner of his eyes, so he quickly locks the screen, and throws his phone on his new bed. He'll reply later, he can't trust himself now, the chances of him saying the wrong thing now is too big. He doesn’t want her to feel like she has to come home and save him.

He walks out of his room, away from the boxes, away from his sister’s messages. Sometimes he wishes, he could walk away from everything else like that too.

Closing the door behind him, he notices the silence that lingers in the house. It seems like his father and June are still asleep or at least not up around the house. At least one good thing this morning has to offer.

Isak decides to take the chance and stroll around the house in peace. Yes, he already did a tour around the house with Eva yesterday, but they did it in a kind of rush. Eva quickly scurried from one room to the other. She was full on excited to explore the house after their swim at the pool. She tried her best to contain her overflowing enthusiasm, but Isak could see it in her eyes, and all over her face.

He saw that certain sparkle and shine, she almost looked like a little kid in a candy store. Isak wasn’t mad at her for feeling like that, really. He actually envied her a bit at this moment. He wished that he could feel that excitement too, instead of this seething anger mixed with that weird numbness inside his chest.

Isak's feet take him past the two stairways, along the long hall to the little, hidden library they discovered yesterday evening. They only spent around five seconds in there since Eva doesn’t like books that much. “Books contain too many words.” She always says that, and Isak doesn’t quite know what she’s trying to say with that.

The first thing Isak does as he enters the room is inhaling – deeply. It’s the only room besides the indoor pool that doesn’t contain that scent of heavy cleanliness. The room carries the familiar and soothing smell of books. New ones and old ones.

Oh, how much Isak loves those smells. His mother used to love it too. Before she started reading a book, she opened its pages and inhaled the scent of it. A weird quirk to others, but Isak loved watching her do it. He loved it to the point, he started doing it himself.

The boy lets his fingers glide over the covers of the books, feeling them under the light touch of his fingertips. The rough material of the covers is tickling his skin, it feels good, comforting even.

Isak ends up in front of a small, dark, wooden door, which he definitely didn’t notice yesterday. Would it be rude to just walk in there? He wonders if it’s some sort of secret back room or anything like that. If it was forbidden to walk in, it would be locked, wouldn’t it be? And June said he could look around, and he should feel at home, so.

For a second Isak thinks about asking first before entering the room, but his curiosity gets the best of him. He slowly and carefully opens the door, and peeks his head in, like a little child checking if the coast’s clear. He doesn’t know why he awaited someone to be in there, but he’s happy that the room's empty. Isak steps in, and closes the door behind him.

The first thing that Isak notices about the room is that it doesn’t quite fit to the rest of June’s house. It’s a bit darker and definitely smaller than any other room. One wall is covered with wooden shelves which are filled with books and even more books. Isak wonders if those books have actually been read or if they’re just here for an aesthetic and decorative purpose. It wouldn’t surprise him if it's the second.

Cautious, small steps lead Isak through the room - scared that being too loud would disturb or kill the atmosphere in the room. He feels safe in here, even more than in the library. It would be great to have a room like this one. Isak wonders if it would be ungrateful to ask June to switch rooms.

The worst thing the woman could say was no, right? So Isak might really try his luck and ask her. He knows that his father will be annoyed as hell, and tell him that he should be happy with the room he got.

“It’s the biggest one in the house after all!” The man reminded him about that fact around six or sevens times yesterday. But Isak doesn’t care about the size or whatever other benefits the other room has to offer. He wants this one – this small, kind of dark room that’s hidden behind the library. A room he feels comfortable in, a room that's him.

.

Isak clears his throat as he walks in the kitchen to remind the two adults that they aren't alone anymore. June and his father stand too closely together for him to feel somewhat comfortable. He doesn’t want to see more lovey-dovey shit between them than necessary.

“Good morning, love,” June sings, and Isak’s eyes widen a bit in surprise. Jesus, how can someone be that happy so early in the morning?

“Morning,” Isak mumbles quietly, and he manages a little smile. He needs to get a grip of himself, and be nice now. He’s on a mission after all.

The boy looks between June and Terje, not really knowing what to do next. He awkwardly walks up to the table, and slowly sits down. He doesn’t like this, not one bit. This here seems too much like a happy family scenario in some crappy advertisement or Hollywood movie. And this thought makes Isak’s skin crawl more than just a bit.

He fights his inner urge to get back up on his feet and run away. He can’t run away, not yet, there’s still something he has to do, though.

“You want some coffee and waffles?” June breaks the silence in the kitchen, her voice a tint nervous.

“Yes, please,” Isak nods, looking from the woman to his father.

His father’s eyes have been on him since he stepped in the kitchen and Isak has tried his best to ignore him. But now he’s looking right into his face with raised brows, silently asking a question Isak doesn’t understand.

“How was your first night, son?” Terje asks after a painfully long minute of staring at each other.

“Okay. I guess,” Isak lies, and manages to give June another smile as she hands him a plate with deliciously looking waffles. “Thanks.”

“Okay is good,” his father nods, but Isak can see it written all over the man’s face that he doesn’t really buy his words.

June pours Isak a mug of coffee, and joins them at the table, nervously glancing between father and son. Isak wonders if she can feel that weird tension in the room as well.

In desperate need to do something with his hands, Isak starts to stuff his mouth with waffles. It's also a good reason to look away from their faces. He swallows his first bite, and curses inwardly because they taste like freaking heaven.

“They’re delicious,” he speaks with his mouth still full.

“Thanks,” June smiles to herself, she almost seems shy about it.

Terje's eyes are still on him, but Isak chooses to ignore him for a little while longer, and shoves bite after bite of June’s wonderful pancakes in his mouth. If the man has something to say, he should spit it out, and stop eyeing him from the side like that.

Isak takes a sip of his coffee and quietly clears his throat, preparing himself to ask about the room behind the library.

“So, um, I… I looked around a bit again before I came down. And, um, I found the room behind the library,” he somehow manages to stumble out. His father’s glare leaves him even more uncomfortable than usual. What's his goddamn problem?

A soft smile dances on June’s lips as she asks “Do you like it?”

“Yeah,” Isak nods slowly. “And that’s why I wanted to, um, ask if I could possibly switch rooms?”

Isak grabs the mug in front of him, and slowly brings it up to his mouth, trying to hide behind it while his eyes wander between his father and June. The frown on his father's forehead is deep, and Isak knows that second that he shouldn’t have asked. He should’ve kept his mouth shut, and stay in the room the man chose for him.

Terje straightens his back in his seat, and says with a strained voice, “June prepared that room for you, and you’re asking for a different one. Don't you think that's a bit rude, son?”

“Sorry,” Isak mumbles behind the mug, takes a small sip of his coffee, and looks down at the table. Yep, he definitely should’ve kept his mouth shut.

“Honey, it’s not rude,” June says, placing her hand on Isak’s, giving it a gentle squeeze. Isak’s eyes snap up to look at her. The glance in her eyes is warm and kind. Isak swallows. “Of course, this room can be yours.”

“You prepared the other room so wonderfully, darling,” Terje says his voice still sounding a tint annoyed. “And his bed won’t even fit in the other room.”

She gives the man a short look, “It’s okay, Terje. I’m sure the bed will fit in there perfectly.”

There’s a sudden tension in the room, another one than just a few minutes ago, and Isak wishes the ground to swallow him whole. It wasn’t his intention to cause an argument between the two adults. Isak feels more than uncomfortable, and regrets once again that he didn’t keep quiet about wanting to switch rooms.

“And if the bed doesn’t fit, we’ll find him a new one,” June’s words still sound kind, but there's an unmistakable determinateness in them. Isak looks at his dad, an honest apologetic half smile on his lips.

“Well, fine then,” Terje sighs in defeat, and shrugs one of his shoulders – it looks kind of acted. Of course, as if he would actually care where his son sleeps anyway. Isak’s more than sure that his father just argued about it in the beginning because he thought June would be upset about Isak wanting to switch rooms. Everything to impress and bless his new woman, right?

“Thanks,” Isak mumbles, and quickly drinks the last sip of his coffee almost choking on the sudden bitter taste of it. He needs to get out of the kitchen, he needs to get away from the weird tension in here.

Back in his room, Isak takes a deep breath. He asks himself how long it will take until his father will bring this back up. The next time they'll end up fighting or maybe it'll be the cause of their next fight?

Once again the ping of his phone – one time, two times, three times – rips him out of his thoughts. He can't ignore his sister forever, and it's more than mean of him to let her suffer like that. The last time he answered was about a week ago. He needs to reply. Now.

.

.

He doesn't send his last question. It wouldn't be fair, so not fair.

It’s never a good idea to talk to his sister when he's overwhelmed and all over the place like that. His inner urge is always enormous to ask her to come back then. He can’t make his sister feel bad about this situation. He can't make her feel bad for being so far away. There's little to nothing she could do anyway, here or not.

Isak deletes the words, letter for letter. He can’t blame her for leaving, no. Lea’s studying abroad thousands of kilometers away from him – in Germany. She’s pursuing her dreams.

Yeah, sometimes Isak’s still mad at her for leaving, but not as much as he used to be. He understands it better now. But still, on some days he misses her so much that he just wants her to jump in the next plane and come back. Sometimes he wants her to stop the life she has over there and be here with him instead – living through this hell with him.

Lea’s decision to leave wasn’t based on selfish intentions. It was her dream ever since. It always had been her dream, Isak can't remember a time she didn't want to leave after graduation. Isak can’t be that selfish, and ask her to give that up, no.

_Come back_. Two simple words that sit on his tongue ever so often when he speaks to her on the phone. The words have never slipped out, yet. Still, they’re lurking in the back of his mind more often than not when they speak to each other.

Probably Lea knows it anyways, he's already noticed that glance in her eyes a few times. That silent question lingering in the dark green “Do you need me to come back?”

Isak tries to ignore it, he quickly switches the topic or tells her about the latest stupid thing he did with Eva and the boys. Too scared these two tiny words will slip out of his mouth, and his sister’s answer would be a soft-spoken “Of course, I’ll come back.” She would say it without hesitation or thinking twice, Isak's sure of it.

He doesn’t want that, he doesn't need it, he can do this on his own. And he has Eva and the boys by his side after all. He isn’t alone, although it might feel like that from time to time.

.

“Do you need help with the bed?” Terje’s voice starts Isak so heavily that the brown moving box almost slips out of his hands.

“What?” Isak says sheepishly, and stares at his father with a confused look on his face.

“I asked if you needed help with the bed, son,” the man repeats his question with a soft chuckle, but this makes Isak only frown.

Why on earth would his father decide to help him? Oh right, okay, it takes him only a few seconds to realize what’s going on here. Terje tries to earn some Brownie points, he tries to smooth things over again with June. Oh God, since when did his father become so predictable?

Isak swallows the stupid remark that wants to make its way out of his mouth, and shrugs instead “Yeah, sure.”

“Great, I’ll get us some tools, and then we can get started,” Terje’s smile is satisfied. Isak rolls his eyes as soon as the man's out of the room. A tiny part of him already regrets agreeing to this. Them working together never ended on good terms, it goes well for about ten minutes – twenty at max – then they end up arguing about the tiniest things.

It takes Isak fifteen minutes and 28 seconds until he’s close to barking at his father that he should leave, and let him do this alone. Listen, he’s in no way a pro at building furniture, but with reading the instructions carefully, and using his brain he can do pretty decent. But his father, damn, his father is the clumsiest klutz with two left hands when it comes to stuff like this.

Terje studies the instruction paper for what feels like the thirtieth time. Isak looks at him with knitted brows, waiting for him to finally accept that they have to do it the way Isak already explained five times.

“Okay,” the man says, exaggerating the word. “We just need to loosen these two screws, and it should be ready to be taken off.”

Isak inwardly counts to five, and takes a deep breath or otherwise he's going to explode right here and now. That is exactly what he’s been trying to tell his father for the past 8 minutes and 15 seconds. He doesn’t want to fight, no, he just wants this damn bed to get in his new room as quick as possible. (And his father to fuck off right after that.)

“Let’s do it then,” Isak says, trying his best to sound nice, and not like he's about to scream right in the man’s face at any second.

To be honest Isak’s doing most of the work, but he doesn’t care, though. With luck, he has to endure only another twenty minutes, and then he'll be alone again.

Another 15 minutes pass until they're eventually done. Terje stands in front of the bed, looking rather proud of himself and the task _he_ has accomplished. Jesus Christ, Isak needs the man out of here before he’ll say something he might regret later.

He fakes a smile at his father, “Thanks, dad.”

“We did a great job,” Terje beams at him, Isak only nods. It’s better for him not to say what's on his mind right now. “Do you need help with anything else?”

“No!” the word flies out his mouth faster than intended, but then he quickly adds. “Thanks, but I need to figure out where to put what and stuff like that, you know.”

“Call me when you need help, okay?” Terje says, thankfully oblivious as always.

“Okay,” Isak fakes another smile. Sometimes it’s scary how easy it is for him to put on an act like this.

His mind and the anger in his stomach ease as soon as his father leaves the room. Next time when his father offers his help to build furniture, Isak has to talk him out of it. He’s sure that he would’ve been finished half an hour ago without his father’s help.

Isak lets his body fall on the bed, he’s already exhausted, and he still has to empty out his moving boxes, and find a place for his stuff. He decides to take a break first, just a short one.

.

Music is loudly belting back from the walls of the indoor pool, but Isak's only hearing it muffled through the water. His body's lazily floating on the surface of the indoor pool, his ears are underwater.

Besides the library and his new room this is his favorite spot in the house. He could stay in here for another few hours, although his skin's already disgustingly wrinkled.

Isak's fascinated how different but good the music sounds while listening to it underwater. It's a phenomenal different sound, so fitting for his mood.

He's floating in a bubble, a big blue bubble filled with his favorite music. Isak closes his eyes, and quietly sings along.

It makes him forget about how frustrated his father’s incompetence left him earlier. About all the anger and emptiness he’s feeling in his chest. It’s like within this bubble his problems, his anger don’t exist. He isn’t lost in here, no, he’s floating above all his problems.

He's dreading going back up into his new room, he still has zero motivation to empty the brown boxes filled with stuff that only remembers him of his old life. A life that has been better, offered him more joy, a life in which he still had dreams and a passion. But that's over now.

Isak lets out a deep sigh, and dives his body underwater to drown these thoughts.

He gets out the water rather slow, expanding the time in here as long as he can. He wishes he could stay for another few hours and forget about all this here. Sounds like heaven to Isak, but he knows that he can't.

Being out of the water he realizes how loud the music actually echoes from the walls. He wonders that his father hasn't stormed in here, yet and yelled at him like he did so often in their old home. Not wanting to ask for trouble Isak turns down the music to a decent volume. He sings along to the song while he dries his body with one of June's big, and incredibly soft towels.

One of his favorite songs is playing, it's actually his favorite song. He'd never admit that, though, but listening to the song Isak always wonders if he'll ever feel that deep for a person to actually dedicate words or poems to them.

Isak rolls his eyes at his own unrealistic and stupid thoughts, of course, this will never happen. He'll never feel that much for another person, not if he can prevent himself from it. He's seen where deep love leads to, and he's seen how it ends. Never in a good way. Love only leads to broken hearts and shattered dreams, and he's already got enough of both.

Out of the indoor pool Isak instantly wishes himself back in the water, back in his comforting, blue bubble. More so as he hears his father's voice calling from the kitchen as he walks by.

“Isak?”

For just a short second, Isak plays with the thought of ignoring his father. He plays with the thought of just walking past the kitchen, running up the stairs to disappear in his room, so he doesn’t have to deal with him right now.

What can Terje possibly want from him?

Isak takes a deep breath to brave himself for whatever is about to come. He peeks his head in the kitchen and asks, “Yeah?”

“Come in here for a second, son,” Terje invites him with a wave of his hand. “There's something I need to tell you.”

His father saying these words make him swallow, most of the times Terje has used those words nothing good followed. These words are tainted by bad news. Terje said them before telling Isak about his mother's illness, he used them again when his mother died, and the last time was when he told Isak about moving in with June.

“Is everything alright, Isak?” Terje searches his son's face, he looks genuinely worried.

“Yeah, everything's fine,” Isak quickly nods. “What is what you wanted to tell me?”

His father doesn't really seem convinced, his eyes roam Isak's face for another two seconds before he clears his throat and eventually decides to let it go.

“We'll have a guest for the summer.”

“A guest?” Isak raises his brows, not really knowing what to make out of this information.

“Yes, June's nephew will spend the summer here with us. He's called her this morning. He's a very talented artist and a very kind person,” Terje explains a little further.

“Okay,” Isak emphasizes the word in a way that makes it more sound like a question. “And what has that to do with me?”

Well, and this seemingly were the wrong words for Isak to say, his father shoots him a look and clicks with his tongue. Sometimes Isak forgets how incredible quick the man can go from acting decent around him to being annoyed with him.

“I'll tell you what this has to do with you, Isak. I want you to behave around him, do you hear me? Maybe this boy can be a good influence for you, you sure could use one.”

Isak’s eyes widen at his father’s words. What the hell is he talking about? Did he just indicate that his friends are a bad influence? Well, it’s no surprise that his father doesn’t really like his friends, Isak guessed as much. Still, he never thought Terje would say something like that about them.

“Are you serious right now? I need _good influence_ and I should _behave_? I'm not a six-year-old for fuck's sake,” Isak barks at his father.

“No? But you sure act like one sometimes! Like right now. Why do you have to make such a fuss about this now? I just asked you to not be rude around him and not to act like an asshole.”

He blankly stares in his father's eyes. Did he just actually call him an asshole? Wow, good to know.

Isak takes a deep breath and counts to six, so he won’t explode into his father’s face. Before he turns on his heels and walks out the kitchen, he says with an indifferent expression on his face “Don't worry, dad, I will stay away as far as I can from June's nephew. We don't want me to exert bad influence on him, right?”

“Isak!” his father yells after him, but Isak doesn't turn around. He jogs up the stairs, and disappears in his room, internally fuming. The anger bubbling in his stomach and his chest. He should've just ignored his father and walked by that damn kitchen.

.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone ❤️ I don't know how many of you are still here to read this, but well here is the long due update ❤️  
As always I hope you liked the new chapter :) The next update won't take me months, I promise, and I will definitely finish this story just like the football au.  
Thanks for reading and leaving comments and kudos .. it still means the world to me ❤️  
Take care in this wild times ❤️  
**  
Mir, my love.. thank you again for never losing hope in me. I love you, forever. You're my angel ❤️

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys :) So I'm here with a new story.. and yeah I know some of you are waiting for chapter 8 of aanidogcaphb and I'm on it, really ♥  
This story has been on my mind for quite some time and now I finally felt ready to post the first chapter. I worked on it whenever I had trouble finding my way back to aanidogcaphb.  
I hope some of you are still here and are joining me on this ride again.. it's going to be angsty, just a little warning, though :)  
And give me another few days and I'll be back with a new chapter of aanidogcaphb as well.  
I love you guys to the moon and back ♥♥♥  
.  
And yet again a big, huge thank you to my love, Mir. She encouraged me to post this, she's probably my fan no. 1 and I couldn't love her more for that ♥ So yet again this is for you, bby ♥


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